Every single large server in this federation has at least one Star Trek community. There is even an entire server dedicated to Star Trek.
Not only that, these communities are some of the most active I’ve ever seen. There is no other franchise I know of that dominates the federation as much as Star Trek does.
So, what’s the correlation with Lemmy and Star Trek? Why not other sci-fi series? Please, are there any connections?? Is this all coincidental?
dominates the federation
Well there you have it.
federates the Dominion
FTFY
I see what you did there
I think it’s nerds. /s
I think a lot of the lemmy userbase are at least somewhat techy (also see the Linux communities), and a lot of techy people like Star Trek.
Techies are Trekkies!
I never really thought about it before, but it seems obvious now. Trekkies and open source tech folks would have a massive overlap, and Lemmy kind of exists perfectly within that intersection of utilitarian principles. So of course we would all find each other here.
I’m convinced that Trekkies and open source tech are concentric circles.
The Star Trek community has been going strong for nearly 60 years for a reason - Star Trek rocks.
When it started in the 60s (and continued especially strong with TNG in the 80s), it was unique in depicting a hopeful look at how things could be rather than a reflection of how things are, differing from how most shows do social commentary. It’s refreshing.
Star Trek is attractive to people who want to see a world where people work together toward great things in a post-scarcity utopia, with current day conversations of race, nationality, sex, gender, etc. being so far in the rear-view mirror that they’re non-issues. Plus cool technology. I think that appeals to the Lemmy crowd.
To me, Trek is a mash of three great communities, each nerdy in their own way:
- Science-fiction, specifically optimistic mid-century science fiction.
- Theatre / Drama
- Revolutionary Socialism
This article scratches the surface of it.
Thank you for the article. I’ll need to look more into this in the future.
So others have already talked about how great Star Trek is. I agree with them, but I think that literally everyone has missed the point of your question:
https://startrek.website
It’s its own lemmy instance. It was spawned from the migration away from reddit, and it’s stayed alive since. So combine an active former-reddit community with lemmy and a good reason to all rally around, and finally the final ingredient of federation, and the Star Trek related rooms will always be on every server, and they’ll always be populated.
Yeah, I think this is a big part of it. The Star Trek sub’s total abandonment of Reddit and conversion to a standalone Lemmy instance during the Blackout was a big deal and a big driver of traffic in those days and beyond.
Star Trek is big in the Threadiverse for the same reason that Earth is big in the Federation. They were a massive force in the early days.
And it’s a great example of how viable lemmy is as an alternative. Not sure about random subs, but any of the really nerdy ones could make the jump.
Both this and all other answers are good for different reasons. From what I’m reading, the beliefs and politics displayed within Star Trek are beyond progressive for the time it came out, while also shaping sci-fi. This creates a very committed fan base that when Reddit started acting up, they were able to move a large chunk of their user base away to Lemmy, since Lemmy is filled with similar-minded people.
When I left reddit because my favorite app rif was shutdown, that was the first instance that caught my eye. I love Star Trek.
- intensely_human ( @intensely_human@lemm.ee ) 54•11 months ago
Asking why Star Trek dominates the Federation? tsk tsk tsk
Like some kind of… Dominion?
no other franchise I know of that dominates the federation as much as Star Trek does.
You answered your own question, brother.
Most of the internet was started with Star Trek boards. If I recall correctly, one of the first emails ever sent was about Star Trek
Also credited with the first widespread fanfics of a TV show, I believe.
I haven’t thought of this in years but back in the '90s I participated in an email fantasy RPG where we all roleplayed Romulans. One person would write a chapter from their character’s POV and email it to the group, then the next person does one, and so on, so the story unfolded in unexpected ways. It was actually pretty fun.
That sounds like such a an awesome early internet thing.
It was. And then of course this one guy asked me if I wanted to take it private so our characters could have their own little love subplot. And uh… I said yes.
Now THAT also sounds like early internet too…
Including the one that is the reason we call laughably stupid perfect characters Mary Sue.
Wow, didn’t know the roots were that deep…
We may never have a good answer for why the gay nerdy communists love the colorful scifi communist space adventures
there is also a lot of communities about programming and linux
there’s only 1 common denominator here. we are all nerds
do you have horticultural tips for growing big bananas?
Guys guys, they’re talking about us!
because star trek has long been welcoming to gay and trans people for their inclusiveness and the fediverse is home to a lot of nerds and gay or trans (or both) people. 💕
I recently started watching TNG for the first time since I was a kid (mostly thanks to the rosa memes). The show is incredibly progressive, especially for a show that came out in 1990. I just watched a race last night where Riker “fell in love” with a member of an androgynous species that were not gendered.
The whole thing was about the individuals struggle to realize their gender identity.
It’s wild to me that I have friends who say dis is too woke because it has real gay, trans, autistic, etc. characters, but they love TNG. Really? You sure forgot a lot of the episodes.
If you think about it, Discovery is probably the least progressive of the entire franchsie, but it caught the ire of conservative-minded people because it presents as normal things earlier shows would have made a point to explain.
It’s the same way TOS had entire episodes dedicated to race, and yet in the 90s many people decsibed Sisko simply existing while black as “pandering to the PC crowd”.
To quote captain Kirk: “Some people can be very frightened of change.”
Agreed. I think the actual problem people have is that it’s not just placeholder characters. They have depth and motivations and yeah, they’re normal people, whether you like it or not. They’re not there as token representation or to push a specific plot point. They just are. It’s like star trek has moved on from showcasing how humanity could be different overall, to showcasing how things could be different for individual people if other people would just stop being dicks about every little thing. They don’t have to push as hard, but there’s more depth to the representation.
TNG had Data allow his child to choose their own gender.
TOS had one of the first televised interracial kisses.
Same reason Linux is popular on Lemmy. Lemmy is essentially an explicitly leftist community that appeals to people nerdy and techy enough to leave Reddit and join a smaller platform. Linux is a FOSS, ie leftist techy OS. Star Trek is leftist Sci-Fi.
Nerds, tech, and leftism all congregate on Lemmy.
dominates the federation
Say it again so the kids in back can hear ye
No Dominion in my federation!
Exactly. The question that answers itself.
Aye-yai Cap-ten!
Almost like it’s some kind of federation…
United Federation of Poindexters
star trek mods successfully moved their communities from reddit back then. afaik the only other community with similar success is the piracy community.
Trek fully embraced the principals of piracy. “You wouldn’t download a car”? Motherfucker, here’s a replicator.
Successfully pulling off a lift-and-move like that was huge. I wish more niche/fandoms had followed suit instead of staying put.
Unfortunately, outside of the meme zone (i.e. !risa@startrek.website) there isn’t a whole lot of engagement anymore. Once the blackout was over, the reddit communities opened back up.
I mean, look at r/DaystromInstitute versus !DaystromInstitute@startrek.website – it’s not pretty.
Well that sucks. I am guilty of really only following Risa, mostly due to big gaps in my watch history and wanting to avoid spoilers for the newer shows. I’m not surprised though… Reddit had (and still has) tremendous amounts of inertia.